KaBlam Review/Transcript
Henry: 'What exactly ''is ''KaBlam? Quite simply, it's soon to be your favorite show in the world. '''June: '''That's because we'll do whatever it takes to be ''your ''favorite. Henry, put your hand over your face. '''Henry: '''Okay, I'll do it! '''June: '*smacks Henry's hand into his face* '''Henry: '''Ow! '''June: ''I'' sent that request in myself. (Intro) Alright, so this is one of those Nicktoons that I actually gave a full review to back in the day. Sort of, it was mainly about one of the segments within it, Life with Loopy. But I did touch on the overall show of KaBlam!. I guess today we're gonna do the opposite of that. And yes, if you've been wondering, shows that I've already given reviews to I am going to give them their own Nick-o-Rama video. I'm sure some people will appreciate me condensing something like my 50+ Korra ''video down into a more digestible 15 minutes. And sometimes like with ''KaBlam!, I can change the focus a bit. And by change the focus, I mean talk about another show entirely: Stickin' Around! (Cut to clip of the Stickin' Around theme song) Stacy: ''For your big fat information'' This is our imagination Me and my friend Bradley What we draw is what you see If you haven't seen this show before, it's really interesting. The pitch of it was that it was designed to be a cartoon that kids themselves would make, as shown by the wild imagination sequences and of course, the stick figure art style. However, if there's any show in the world that I think that actually applies to, a show made by kids, it would have to be ''KaBlam!. If kids could make a cartoon, or at least, nineties kids could make a cartoon, this is ''exactly ''what that cartoon would look like. I mean, ''Action League Now! ''showcases the perfect experiences of playing with a random mismatch of toys. I'm pretty sure back in the day, I took some of my own toys on similar adventures. ''Life with Loopy ''goes into these random, bizarre adventures that feel very much like a creative childishness, just taking one step of craziness after another like a child making things up as they go along. Loopy eats a bunch of eggs, turns into an egg and then gets chased around by a giant chicken. It's delightful. The show is even marketed as a fusion of cartoons and comics. And that's where our main ''KaBlam! ''segments come in. They were hosted by Henry and June and in between the shorts, they get into all kinds of crazy shenanigans, trying to repeatedly one-up each other. Or tormenting each other in some hilarious way. I'm just gonna get this out of the way, Henry and June have this '''fantastic '''dynamic. Their friendship feels...like a very much real thing, and they've always got a perfect comeback to each other. While you could say that many different characters play off each other very well, with these two, it really feels like that they've known each other for years. They really ''do feel like childhood friends, and I mean I guess it's kind of true since it is a spinoff of ''All That. The most obvious thing I can say about ''KaBlam! ''is that it's...the most "nineties" of all of the Nicktoons. '''Henry: '''Ugh! June, what are you doing? '''June: '''I am demonstrating one of my many superpowers. *turns her eyelids inside out* That's a pretty bold claim, I understand, considering that we have ''Ren & Stimpy ''and ''Rocko's Modern Life ''behind us. But let's be real here. ''Ren & Stimpy ''is technically timeless. Sure, the show could have ''only been made in the nineties, but the episodes can take place in any time, and it frequently does reference themes from an age long before the nineties. And as we've learned, ''Rocko ''works fairly similarly in the 2010s than it did in the nineties. Nineties references and styles, and just the attitude of the nineties is built into ''KaBlam's bones. Unlike say, Rocket Power here, it feels a lot more '''genuine. Rocket Power ''is a show that is clearly just pandering, but ''KaBlam! ''feels right on the level of kids in the nineties. And I gotta say, it is one of those few shows that genuinely takes me back to my own childhood. Like with ''Hey Arnold!, I appreciate that show and its stories and it is my favorite Nicktoon of the nineties, but it's something that I appreciate with an adult's hindsight. Rocko's something that I only really appreciate it as an adult. Meanwhile, KaBlam! ''is one of those shows that actually makes me feel like a kid again. There are a lot of nineties pop culture references in this show, as well. It's not as bad as say...''Gex... Gex: 'Would Cheech and/or Chong report to the front desk? But if you weren't around at the time, a lot of this might be lost on you. I know the saying "only nineties kids will get this" is a pretty stale saying at this point, but if there's anything in the world that it's applicable to, it would probably be ''KaBlam!. That, and the cartoon Recess. Only nineties kids will get Recess ''cause, you know, only nineties kids got ''recess. This is kind of a tradeoff of being timely, when you ''so strongly capture the voice and the themes of your time, it could be a lot of trouble to go back, and you do age poorly. To put it bluntly, this show is filled with a touch of grossout. Not as much as Ren & Stimpy, but this show is definitely very comfortable with its grosser edge. There is a lot of random nonsense. However, unlike most shows that are just random for the sake of it, I do think that this one follows a bit of logic from one point to the next. KaBlam! ''is unique from all of the other Nicktoons, being an anthology series. No, I don't count ''Oh Yeah! Cartoons ''as a Nicktoon and I'm not doing it in this retrospective. While the show had this theme of comic books, the cartoons within were all essentially failed pilots. Only two of which, ''Action League Now! and Angela Anaconda actually got made into an actual show. Sniz & Fondue ''was the creator's first attempt at making a cartoon, and it could have been the fourth Nicktoon. But it lost to ''Rocko's Modern Life. And later when it had the chance again, it got beaten by Spongebob. I actually kinda wanna see that reality where Spongebob ''lost to ''Sniz & Fondue ''of all things. Actually, I'm not sure that I do. ''Sniz & Fondue ''segments...they weren't my favorite. In a show that had '''so' many unique styles and different animation types, Sniz & Fondue ''was kind of boring in comparison to everything else. It was a 2D animated cartoon about two brothers and their family doing typical cartoon things. Like buying a very poisonous scorpion to keep your brother out of your room. Compare that to say, ''Prometheus and Bob. That's a stop-motion cartoon that's mostly done without ''any ''dialogue. It's about an alien teaching a caveman things about civilization like, music. It's not the most original idea in the world, but it's certainly interesting, and it did it in a unique way. And of course, Life with Loopy has such an endearing character, and the most unique scenarios that I've ever seen in any cartoon. Seriously, if there's one thing that I can recommend you checking out if nothing else here seems interesting, it's Life with Loopy. You can watch the episodes separately on YouTube. I do believe that Loopy ''alone is one of the best cartoons of the nineties. Unfortunately, this is also where ''Angela Anaconda ''spawned which is one of the 'worst 'cartoons of the nineties. Luckily, ''Loopy ''was a mainstay and ''Angela ''only had two segments. Unfortunately though, the ''KaBlam! ''version of ''Angela looks worse, and is...much worse. It's definitely a good thing that these pilots got their chance to shine. It stopped them from fading into obscurity. Heh, heh...uh...I wish. About that. Did I ever tell you that Nickelodeon can be very, very stupid? Because they can be very, very stupid. And making KaBlam! was probably one of their biggest fuck-ups. Now, like I said, I love this show, but, let's go over the problems that Nickelodeon had with this show. One of the segments is called Lava!. (Shows intro for Lava!) It's an abstract "thing" that's hard to describe. If you've never seen it, I don't blame you since Nickelodeon had to cut them all out from the episodes. Nickelodeon never 'had the copyright to ''Lava!. Instead, they only had the airing rights, which expired in 2000. But don't worry, even after they lost the airing rights, they still kept clips in some of the end credits scenes. Uh, yes, I find the irony of Nickelodeon committing copyright infringement absolutely hilarious. Except for many of the segments Nickelodeon actually ''does own the copyright. Nickelodeon owns the copyright to the recurring segments like ''Action League Now!, but as for many of the minor segments, not so much. Angela Anaconda ''for instance, is owned by Disney. And for the shorts that never got made into cartoons, they probably belong to the original copyright creators. This is probably one of the catalysts that led to Nickelodeon being a bit..."tougher" on copyright let's say. From copyrighting Spongebob's voice to copyrighting pilots like ''Constant Payne. Creators having the copyright to their work is definitely for the best, I think, but there are always going to be sacrifices no matter which road we take. And one of those sacrifices is going to be shows like KaBlam!. Nickelodeon has ''aired some of the episodes on The Splat, but, they are not legally allowed to show others. They don't have the rights to the episodes with minor, one-off shorts, and it would take '''thousands '''of dollars to get the rights from all of these different creators, for the show that has ''largely ''faded into obscurity. And that's assuming that you can even track them down, and that they even wanted to let their shorts be seen again ['Caption: And that they're still alive at all.]. All it takes is one "no" and you can't show the whole thing. And need I remind you,'' Angela Anaconda''' is owned by Disney, and I highly doubt they're going to say yes to one of their main television competitors. Don't worry though, sooner or later, Disney's going to own everything on the planet and this won't be a problem ever again, and we'll finally have ''KaBlam! ''on Blu-Ray. This may be why Nickelodeon let this show rot after the first season, not giving a shit about it. Let's just say that some aspects of the show can be really, really rare. ['Caption: Correction, this was the only episode released on VHS. Period.] One of the episodes was shown in 3D. If you want to watch this episode in 3D, you're in luck! It was only released as a promotion with Tombstone Pizza. On a VHS tape. So all you need to do is find a VHS as a part of an obscure promotion from a semi-obscure show that happened in the late nineties, and you'll be able to see the episode "Won't Crack or Peel" in its ''glorious ''3D. So, you're probably wondering where I got my episodes considering I have done two videos on KaBlam! ''so far, if it's impossible to buy this show anywhere. Well, you didn't hear this from me, but one of the staff members has released every single episode on his website, and they're all free for viewing or watching ['Caption: They can all also be found on YouTube. Chances are slim that Viacom will do anything about it.']. Just keep it on the down low because...I'd like them to stay there for as long as possible, cause after those episodes are gone, this show may be one that will slowly be lost '''foreve'r due to the copyright shit surrounding it. 'Announcer: '''Next on Nickelodeon... ''(Shows clips of Angry Beavers theme song) (End Credits Theme: Angela Anaconda Theme Song) Category:Nick-o-Rama Category:Transcripts